Coronavirus Outbreak

[ken_sylvania]

So the implication is, it's all about the money?

No, I get a splash screen that will not let me read it unless I get an account. I will not do that with the NYT, so I can not read the article.

Neat little trick - as soon as the page starts loading but before the splash screen loads hit the esc key on your keyboard. If you time it right the text will load but not the splash screen.

[Ken]

So the implication is, it's all about the money?

No, I get a splash screen that will not let me read it unless I get an account. I will not do that with the NYT, so I can not read the article.

Neat little trick - as soon as the page starts loading but before the splash screen loads hit the esc key on your keyboard. If you time it right the text will load but not the splash screen.

If it is something you really want to read, you can also do a quick Control-A then Control-C to copy the text before the splash screen appears, then paste it into Word or some other text editor to read. I have done that before as well. They usually program in a delay to tempt you with the article before covering it up.

[Valerie]

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/11/19 ... s-mandates

So why aren't more countries looking to Brazil as an example?

Behind the pay wall. What does it say basically?

The link is to the NYT "Covid Updates" page which is a constantly changing stream of news updates. I see nothing about Brazil there now. The top articles are about Austria and Germany.

There wasn't anything about Brazil. I'm just wondering why Brazil is not being used as an example to other countries who choose to take extreme measures like Austria and Germany

[Ken]

Behind the pay wall. What does it say basically?

The link is to the NYT "Covid Updates" page which is a constantly changing stream of news updates. I see nothing about Brazil there now. The top articles are about Austria and Germany.

There wasn't anything about Brazil. I'm just wondering why Brazil is not being used as an example to other countries who choose to take extreme measures like Austria and Germany

Brazil has one of the highest per-capita Covid death rates in the world. It is more than 2x higher than Germany or Austria. Why would other countries be looking at Brazil as an example?

[Robert]

Interesting perspective.

[GaryK]

[Dan Z]

UPDATE: Here in Minnesota, we've had among the worst COVID rates in the country for the past few weeks (2nd to Michigan right now).

Hospital space has really become a concern, so much so that both the governor and president have dispatched military medical teams to some of the larger overrun hospitals in the state, including St. Cloud which is the largest acute care medical center near to us. They have been essentially out of ICU space and sufficient staff for a month now - which means that if I or someone in my family or town has a heart attack, stroke, burst appendix, car accident, or any manor of major calamity, we might not find the timely medical care we need. Like all of our neighbors, we're hoping to stay as safe and healthy as possible.

Who is being hospitalized is an interesting question. Vaccination rates in urban centers like Minneapolis are higher, but the rates are much lower out here in the rural areas, so our hospitalization rates are higher. "Breakthrough cases" are also occurring more frequently now, but older unvaccinated folks are significantly overrepresented in hospitalizations.

Here's a comparison chart of hospitalization rates for vaccinated vs unvaccinated in various age groups from MN Department of health data:

[mike]

Right now, I have two in-laws who have mild cases of Covid.

One is a sister-in-law who was vaccinated in April/May of this year; didn't get a booster. The other is a brother-in-law who had Covid exactly a year ago. Their symptoms are mild fatigue and low grade fever.

[RZehr]

Last week there were two men from our churches go to the hospital. One went on a ventilator. Both were in good physical condition prior. Thankfully they seem to be doing much better now.
My father in law and mother in law both had Covid last week, but are doing good now. Had monoclonal treatments.
None were vaccinated.

Re breakthrough infections/dripping vaccine effectiveness - I wonder if there is anyone out there that is studying the relationship between the growing breakthroughs in vaccinated people, and the amount of time from their vaccines and the breakthroughs. I’m sure it’s a mix, but like, is one of the vaccines worse or better, does it matter which virus variant is in circulation, and what is the correlation between breakthroughs and 2/4/6/8/10 months after getting the shot.

[RZehr]

First I’ve heard of this vaccine.

A new vaccine designed to specifically create T-cells against Covid produces a better immune response than the alternatives already in use, according to trial data.

The CoVac-1 jab has been developed and made by academics at the University of Tubingen, in Germany.
…….

Data suggest that the vaccine, a single shot in the stomach, produces 3.5 times as many T-cells as the Pfizer/BioNTech jab and 20 times as many as the AstraZeneca vaccine. "Furthermore, vaccine-induced T-cell responses were unaffected by current SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern," the scientists said.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/covid-vaccin ... 31929.html

A shot in the stomach?! That doesn’t sound very nice.